Abstract
Weighted addition is an elemental multi-input to single-output operation that can be implemented with high-performance photonic devices. Microring (MRR) weight banks bring programmable weighted addition to silicon photonics. Prior work showed that their channel limits are affected by coherent inter-channel effects that occur uniquely in weight banks. We fabricate two-pole designs that exploit this inter-channel interference in a way that is robust to dynamic tuning and fabrication variation. Scaling analysis predicts a channel count improvement of 3.4-fold, which is substantially greater than predicted by incoherent analysis used in conventional MRR devices. Advances in weight bank design expand the potential of reconfigurable analog photonic networks and multivariate microwave photonics.
© 2018 Optical Society of America
Full Article | PDF ArticleMore Like This
Alexander N. Tait, Hasitha Jayatilleka, Thomas Ferreira De Lima, Philip Y. Ma, Mitchell A. Nahmias, Bhavin J. Shastri, Sudip Shekhar, Lukas Chrostowski, and Paul R. Prucnal
Opt. Express 26(20) 26422-26443 (2018)
Alexander N. Tait, Thomas Ferreira de Lima, Mitchell A. Nahmias, Bhavin J. Shastri, and Paul R. Prucnal
Opt. Express 24(8) 8895-8906 (2016)
Philip Y. Ma, Alexander N. Tait, Thomas Ferreira de Lima, Siamak Abbaslou, Bhavin J. Shastri, and Paul R. Prucnal
Opt. Express 27(13) 18329-18342 (2019)